Good Parents – And what should they tell their kids about money!

Given the fact that the market is at all-time highs, valuations of companies are at all-time highs, and where we are in the classic boom-bust, rinse-repeat, business cycle; many people are wondering what to do with their investment money. For those already invested, perhaps with some gains over the years, is now a good time to pull out and put the money somewhere else? For those who have maybe just come into some money they are wondering if they should invest in the market, in real-estate, a business, or perhaps something else? Of course, these are perfectly normal questions and there is never any easy answer.

If you happen to have children and have ever sought parenting advice about how to handle certain situations, you might find this to be a similar exercise. I remember when my children were younger and my spouse and I had parenting questions we would seek the answers from various sources – essentially either asking grandparents, friends, reading books, online articles and forums, and of course each other. The thing was, we very rarely ever received similar advice. Investing is a bit like that, depending on who you ask you may get a different answer. Typically, people turn to their friends and in some cases a financial advisor. Your friends, each one of them has their own thing as well as their own appetite for risk and research and whatever it is they may be into – real-estate, stocks, gold-bugs, running a business, art or whatever it is they may be doing. Even financial advisors will give different views depending on their bias.

Another source of advice which most of us mere mortals do not have access to are the high end institutional and private wealth asset managers. These are the folks managing the money for high and ultra-high net worth individuals. This is considered the smart money. It turns out that these folks have exactly the same questions about where and how to invest their money. And given the large sums involved, depending on how the smart money ends up answering these questions and wherever the smart money is placed can have significant impact across industries, sectors and markets across the globe.

This is why we have created The Hutch Report – Wealth Management Report and Insights from the Top 50 Wealth Management Institutions – which provides an aggregated view of where the smart money is looking and what options may exist for replicating smart money trades or alternatively, taking a contrarian view by understanding the consensus. As with anything, no one has all the answers. This edition of The Hutch Report is a great tool to help figure out how to answer the questions mentioned at the top of this post.